from crux № 19 — Free market
Robert Heinlein had a phrase which got adopted by libertarians everywhere. TANSTAAFL, or There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch. That doesn't stop people from believing when they are promised one and are too lazy.
There is a great quote by Lawrence W. Reed:
"It constantly amazes me that the defenders of the free market are expected to offer certainty and perfection while government has only to make promises and express good intentions."
Government creates the price distortions. There is no way to factor that out as long as government is involved.
There is no way a prudent person can foresee a vote in Congress or the publication of new regulations, much less the second and third order consequences. By the time we hit the feedback loop, everything is subject to change.
Actually, the more government gets involved, the more the market gets "deformed." And that is when the politicos call for "reform."
If you want to solve the problem, start by getting government out of the loan game.
One that is designed to take advantage of the people who can't pay it back.
Without the "free money" provided by the Feds, the prices would be what people could afford. It's the "free money" that drives the prices up.
When somebody gets "something for nothing," that is exactly the worth they put on it.
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
Neither help nor hinder, that is religious freedom.
You can't convict someone because they are members of a religious group. You can convict someone because of crimes they have committed.
Some people I know are all too ready to convict all Christians of horrendous crimes. Would you like to be judged?
Except those outsourced wages are usually higher than the prevailing wage in the area and often result in an economic jumpstart in that impoverished area.
There are other beneficial effects too, but since they are second and third order, most casual observers ignore them.
Basically, the wages don't have to match those in the US as long as they are higher than the average pay.
When the wages match the major industrial nations, that is one sign that nation is now industrialized as well. And the search starts for more cheap labor, the cycle starts all over again.
I disagree. I think "free to choose" applies to more than just economics. I think ideas work best in a "free market" too.
I'm sorry, but I have to stop you right there. It wasn't Judeo-Christian based. Look at the Constitution. Other than the date, there is not a single mention of Christianity. This was very unusual for any government document at the time. This was deliberate.
Christianity was only one of many influences. It's amazing I even have to mention this when one house of the national legislature is called the Senate and the other has a ceremonial mace based on a Roman fasces.
E pluribus unum. The original motto of the United States, roughly translated into "one from many." Or as I prefer, "united we stand." It's not just the people, it's the ideas.
And it is not specifically or even mostly Christian.
I didn't say no codified laws.
I just said that I thought we could do public morality without enshrining a religious system as The Moral Authority.
While I agree that religion can be an excellent source of personal morality, I don't think it works on a cultural level if there are multiple faiths in that culture.
So we have to start from another basis.
I started keeping my crux files because I noticed I kept getting into the same discussions in comment threads on other people’s web sites. After a while it just made sense for me to organize my thoughts by topic. These are snippets. It’s not in any particular order, it’s just discussions I have again and again.
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